In 1938, upon the Anschluss [5], Hitler demanded the annexation of Danzig [6], and it became clear to us that war was close. In March 1939 the first mobilization to the army in Poland was announced. My older brother Lev was recruited to the army.
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peter rabtsevich
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I finished trade school in 1939. I became an electrician. I couldn't find a job and began to assist my father in the orchard (growing apples, pears, plums and cherries). My father took care of the orchard paying a purely symbolic rental fee. We often went there on hot days to rest in the cool shade of fruit trees.
My younger brothers, David and Aron, finished school. David became a shop assistant in Abraham Warshavskiy's store.
We were all very concerned. The Polish authorities requested assistance from the population: contributions for the purchase of ammunition for the army, especially for air defense purposes. People began to make shelters in their gardens.
After the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact [7] between Germany and the Soviet Union in 1939, the war in Poland began. In early December trains with the wounded began to arrive in Pinsk. A hospital was arranged in the Jesuit church. Our father and we went to look for our brother in this hospital. We just thought he might happen to be among the wounded, or we just hoped to get word of him from those that might have met him at the front. Many refugees were coming to Pinsk from other districts of Poland.
After the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact [7] between Germany and the Soviet Union in 1939, the war in Poland began. In early December trains with the wounded began to arrive in Pinsk. A hospital was arranged in the Jesuit church. Our father and we went to look for our brother in this hospital. We just thought he might happen to be among the wounded, or we just hoped to get word of him from those that might have met him at the front. Many refugees were coming to Pinsk from other districts of Poland.
On 17th September 1939 the Soviet army crossed the Polish-Soviet border and on 20th September they were in Pinsk. The Polish power was suppressed. Soon all synagogues and Jewish schools, public and private, were closed. The Jewish population was happier to have the Soviet army in power than the Germans. We were aware of the German attitude towards Jews.
In November 1939 I went to work at the Western River Transport Agency. I got a job as a communications mechanic.
Riva became an accountant at the Food Trade Agency.
, Belarus
My younger brothers went to the Jewish school. They studied Yiddish as well as Russian and Belarus.
, Belarus
We didn't know anything about our brother Lev. He came home in 1940. He had escaped from German captivity and walked as far as Brest. He was kept in the Brest fortress for over a month while the Soviet military collected all necessary information about him. They released him and he came home.
Lev went to work at the town hospital and studied at the Medical College in Pinsk.
In 1941 the Soviet authorities began to deport wealthier families to Siberia [8]. Refugees from Poland were also 'hostile elements' and deported to Siberia in their majority. By 21st June 1941, 900 families of refugees remained in Pinsk.
Every year we go to Pinsk, where our dear ones are buried. Our children and grandchildren know the history of our family. I told them about the man that rescued me. My son goes to Pinsk every year. I couldn't go there last year due to my illness, and he went alone. There are graves of three families related to us.
I have always tried to find my rescuer. I even wrote to the Embassy of Germany, but there were no results. I was trying to find Krull, Frioff and Shtoide but the officials replied that Germans had never rescued Jews, and our officials told me that it was 'politically incorrect' to be looking for a German friend.
In 1996 inmates from ghettos in Warsaw and Krakow invited Jewish ghetto and camp inmates from Kiev to visit their towns. This visit was sponsored by the Maximilian Kolbe Werk. [This is a German charity organization supporting former concentration camp prisoners and trying to bring about reconciliation.] I was in one of the groups. In Warsaw we were met by the representatives of the Polish ghetto inmates and Margaret and Werner Muller, a German couple from Cologne. I talked to the Mullers about my rescuer and asked them if they could help me find him or his relatives. I also told them that there were two more rescuers that had helped me. It was difficult to speak German. I hadn't spoken it for 54 years, and the German I spoke was closer to Yiddish.
On 14th November 1996 the Mullers called me from Cologne and said that they had received some information from the military archives. Krull died at the age of 62 in 1979. Shtoide was missing. Krull's wife Christine and their daughter Janine knew that Krull had rescued a certain Rabinov in the ghetto in Pinsk and wanted to meet with me. Margaret and Werner Muller sponsored my wife's and my trip to Germany. We stayed with the Mullers in Cologne, and they paid all our expenses. We visited the grave of Krull in Dusseldorf, and his wife Christine Krull. We met Krull's daughter Janine in Dusseldorf. I told her about the children of the ghetto who knew that they were going to die. We both cried. In 1997 my story was placed in the Yad Vashem museum [18] in Jerusalem. On 10th January 1999 my German rescuer, Gunter Krull, was awarded the title of the Righteous Among the Nations' [19] posthumously. On 3rd February 2002 Werner Muller found Hans-Joachim Shtoide, who had supported me in Kiev at the request of Gunter Krull. I talked with him on the phone. The first thing he said was how glad he was that I survived.
Muller wrote a book about my rescuers. It was published in German and Belarus. [The German version of the book was published by the Dittrich Verlag, Cologne, under the title Aus dem Feuer gerissen. Die Geschichte des Pjotr Ruwinowitsch Rabzewitsch aus Pinsk in 2001.] I think that this book is a monument to my family and to all Jews of Pinsk exterminated in the ghetto, a condemnation of fascism and a monument to Gunter Krull, Mr. Shtoide, corporal Frioff and to my dear friends Margaret and Werner Muller, who dedicated five years of their lives to find my rescuers.
In 1996 inmates from ghettos in Warsaw and Krakow invited Jewish ghetto and camp inmates from Kiev to visit their towns. This visit was sponsored by the Maximilian Kolbe Werk. [This is a German charity organization supporting former concentration camp prisoners and trying to bring about reconciliation.] I was in one of the groups. In Warsaw we were met by the representatives of the Polish ghetto inmates and Margaret and Werner Muller, a German couple from Cologne. I talked to the Mullers about my rescuer and asked them if they could help me find him or his relatives. I also told them that there were two more rescuers that had helped me. It was difficult to speak German. I hadn't spoken it for 54 years, and the German I spoke was closer to Yiddish.
On 14th November 1996 the Mullers called me from Cologne and said that they had received some information from the military archives. Krull died at the age of 62 in 1979. Shtoide was missing. Krull's wife Christine and their daughter Janine knew that Krull had rescued a certain Rabinov in the ghetto in Pinsk and wanted to meet with me. Margaret and Werner Muller sponsored my wife's and my trip to Germany. We stayed with the Mullers in Cologne, and they paid all our expenses. We visited the grave of Krull in Dusseldorf, and his wife Christine Krull. We met Krull's daughter Janine in Dusseldorf. I told her about the children of the ghetto who knew that they were going to die. We both cried. In 1997 my story was placed in the Yad Vashem museum [18] in Jerusalem. On 10th January 1999 my German rescuer, Gunter Krull, was awarded the title of the Righteous Among the Nations' [19] posthumously. On 3rd February 2002 Werner Muller found Hans-Joachim Shtoide, who had supported me in Kiev at the request of Gunter Krull. I talked with him on the phone. The first thing he said was how glad he was that I survived.
Muller wrote a book about my rescuers. It was published in German and Belarus. [The German version of the book was published by the Dittrich Verlag, Cologne, under the title Aus dem Feuer gerissen. Die Geschichte des Pjotr Ruwinowitsch Rabzewitsch aus Pinsk in 2001.] I think that this book is a monument to my family and to all Jews of Pinsk exterminated in the ghetto, a condemnation of fascism and a monument to Gunter Krull, Mr. Shtoide, corporal Frioff and to my dear friends Margaret and Werner Muller, who dedicated five years of their lives to find my rescuers.
,
After WW2
See text in interview
Regretfully, I haven't been in Israel, but I do hope to have a chance to go to this holy land. I hope that politicians will be wise enough to put an end to fighting and establish peace in this country.
Eva Ryzhevskaya
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In 1960 I was assigned chief of the physiotherapy department of the hospital. Of course, it was a promotion, but I didn't get a pay rise. We didn't have enough money for a comfortable living. So I had to look for additional work. When my daughter turned one, I went to work half time for the military academy of chemical defense. I held lectures there three times a week for four hours. I worked there for thirteen years.
They treated me very well at work. They loved me and appreciated my work. I really worked very hard and didn't refuse anybody. Apart from the main work people were supposed to be involved in social work. I spread propaganda. I had extracurricular activities every week. Every week I was supposed to follow the press, the news in the political sphere of the country and foreign countries as well. Every Thursday I was to hold a special political class with students telling them the main events in the political life. I was supposed to cover those events from the standpoint of the communist ideology. Those classes were extracurricular, so people were not willing to attend them, but it was mandatory for them to be present. In case somebody skipped such classes he was fraught with administrative punishment, including dismissal. I remember how dreadful it was for me to speak about the horrors of the Israeli 'aggressors' on Palestinian land... but I had no way out, I could only express the official point of view.
Leonid wooed me for three years. First I didn't want to be with him, as I thought that he should live for his daughter. His child needed a father. Finally he broke down my resistance. His courtship was spectacular. There was a mail box with a slot on my door. Every morning when I went out, I saw a bouquet of flowers in my mailbox and the words on my fence, 'I was here,' and the date. I never saw him bringing the flowers or writing the words on my fence. Then we started seeing each other. We got married in 1952. We didn't have a wedding party. We just registered our marriage in the state registration office and had a festive dinner with our closest relatives afterwards.
I met my future husband at work. Leonid Krichevskiy was an engineer. He worked with medical X-ray and physiotherapy apparatus. Leonid graduated from college. He was a jack-of-all-trades. He was good at mechanics. Leonid previously worked in the military hospital and was responsible for equipment repair. In 1948 Leonid came to work in our hospital because of the mass dismissal of Jews. He was much older than me.
Only after the Twentieth Party Congress [45], where Nikita Khrushchev [46] divulged Stalin's crimes, I understood that it was good to live without Stalin, without constant fear. After Khrushchev's speech it all dawned on me. In the lines people were facing death and were ready to die for Stalin. But if there had been no Stalin, there might have been no war. At any rate there wouldn't have been so many casualties. If there hadn't been repressions as of 1937, if Stalin hadn't decapitated the army, and killed the best military commanders, Hitler wouldn't have dared to attack us. Post- war repressions are also on Stalin's conscience.
On 5th March 1953 Stalin died. Of course, we, doctors, anticipated his death. In radio round-ups we were informed that Stalin had Cheyne-Stokes respiration, and everybody understood that he was on the brink of death. When I found out about his death, I had a feeling that the world would plunge into the abyss. I couldn't fathom how we could possibly live without Stalin. It was sincere grief. When I was on the ward round, I dissolved in tears. Then I went to Stalin's funeral. I walked amid a huge crowd on semi- thawed snow.
It was the hardest for us when the Doctors' Plot [44] started. When the articles about 'Murderers in white robes' appeared in the newspapers, party meetings and team meetings were held to discuss the cases of the doctors poisoning people. At that time we understood that it was a libel. The most famous and the brightest doctors all of a sudden were turned into murderers! But I had to attend those meetings and raise my hand when we were voting for condemnation of the criminals. If I hadn't raised my hand, they would have fired me or put me in prison in the worst case. It was a dreadful time. Patients didn't change their attitude, neither to me nor to other Jewish doctors who worked in our hospital. Anyway, nobody openly showed mistrust and nobody refused to be treated by Jewish doctors. People were not that silly. They understood what was going on.
It was the hardest for us when the Doctors' Plot [44] started. When the articles about 'Murderers in white robes' appeared in the newspapers, party meetings and team meetings were held to discuss the cases of the doctors poisoning people. At that time we understood that it was a libel. The most famous and the brightest doctors all of a sudden were turned into murderers! But I had to attend those meetings and raise my hand when we were voting for condemnation of the criminals. If I hadn't raised my hand, they would have fired me or put me in prison in the worst case. It was a dreadful time. Patients didn't change their attitude, neither to me nor to other Jewish doctors who worked in our hospital. Anyway, nobody openly showed mistrust and nobody refused to be treated by Jewish doctors. People were not that silly. They understood what was going on.
There were very many Jews in our hospital. The chief physician was also a Jew. Our department was even referred to as 'synagogue' in the municipal health care department. Of course, it was another demonstration that anti-Semitists didn't even conceal their attitude. In 1948 the campaign against cosmopolitans [40] started, and we were aware that anti-Semitism didn't only occur on a social level, it was enhanced to the state level. The Jewish theater in Moscow was closed down, and its manager, a wonderful actor and the head of the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee [41], Solomon Mikhoels [42] was assassinated. His assassination was disguised as a car accident. But everybody understood what was going on, and feared that repressions might follow. Everybody understood that it was propaganda. There were rumors that Jews would be exiled to Siberia, and people believed that. There were times in Soviet history when certain people were forced to move [see Forced deportation to Siberia] [43]: Crimean Tartars, Germans, Chechens, Ingush. Nevertheless, anti-Semitism wasn't felt in our hospital. On the contrary, during the campaign against cosmopolitans, the best doctors of the city were working in our hospital. I was lucky I worked with great experts and learnt from them.
Physiotherapy was my main job. I liked neuropathology and took up a few neuropathology cases. I was on good terms with a very qualified neurologist, a Jew named Solomon Kantorovich. We worked in the same hospital. He taught me, and treated the patients independently. There were very many Jews in our hospital. The chief physician was also a Jew.
In 1948 the state of Israel was founded. It was a real joy for me. I was happy that the USSR was one of the initiators for the foundation of the state of Israel. Though, later on the relationship between the USSR and Israel was harmed. The USSR deemed Israel to become its satellite, one of the countries of the socialistic camp, ?nd Israel decided to follow its own way. The Soviet government could not forgive that. However, we followed the events in Israel and were concerned. I took such pride in Jewish people when they gained victory in the Six-Day-War [38] and Yom Kippur War [39]. Jews knew how to build their country and how to protect it as well.
When I finished my courses the municipal health care department sent me to town hospital #29 to work as a physiotherapist. I worked there for over 40 years. The only way to get to Moscow was by electric train. Later on, buses went to Moscow, too. It took me so long to get to work, that I had no time for anything else after work. I came home just before going to bed.
I stayed with my brother. He lived with his family in a two-room communal apartment, located in a two-storied barrack without conveniences. Toilet and water pump were outside. The apartment was heated with a stove, which was in the corridor between the rooms. We were heating it in turns with another family, who lived in our apartment. We cooked food on a Primus stove. I didn't think I would stay there, but I ended up living in my brother's apartment for 18 years. I had a sofa in the corner of the room, which was partitioned with a folding screen. Now Kuntsevo is a district of Moscow, but back then it was a village of Moscow region.
Olga is a determined person, and she is not prone to phobias. She isn't afraid of changes. She does fear to be without money or a job though. She believes there is a way out from any situation. I think it's in her genes to be aware of fascism. She knows that her relatives were murdered by fascists, and she is afraid that the fascists could come to power in Russia. She is constantly trying to convince me to leave for Israel. Of course, I understand that my daughter will not leave me. I want to die in my motherland. I don't believe that fascism would be a driving force in our country, which had suffered so much from fascism. We will see, maybe I am too optimistic.
Fascism appeared in Russia along with the revival of the Jewish life. More and more young people are imbued with fascist ideology. I think it's on a social level, but my daughter is sure that the fascists would like to come to power in our country.
Jewish life appeared in independent Russia. I heard from other people that there are many Jewish societies that provide significant assistance to people. I usually stay in. It's hard for me to go anywhere. I don't get assistance from charitable organizations.